During a press conference the president once again avoided any accountability for the disaster.

People try to recover their belongings to start rebuilding their house that was destroyed by Hurricane Maria, in Morovis, Puerto Rico, Saturday, Oct. 14, 2017. CREDIT: AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa

President Donald Trump renewed his claim that Puerto Rico’s humanitarian crisis is one of its own making during a press conference on Monday, while defending his administration from growing accusations over the slowness of federal efforts on the island.

“Puerto Rico is very tough because of the fact that it’s an island. It’s also tough because, as you know, it was in very poor shape before the hurricanes ever hit,” Trump said.

The president went on to reference relief efforts in the mainland states of Texas and Florida where recovery efforts from Hurricanes Harvey and Irma have been underway for over a month, as well as the U.S. Virgin Islands.

“We are working right now, as you know, relief funds were just approved, [and are] in the process of becoming approved. That includes Texas, that includes Florida. It also includes Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands. But,” Trump said, circling back to Puerto Rico, “it was in really bad shape before.”

“Their electrical grid was destroyed before the hurricanes got there. It was in very bad shape. [It] was not working,” Trump said during the press conference, linking the island’s financial struggles to the grid’s condition. “Now, you’re going to have to build a whole new electrical plant system… The fact that, their electrical system was in horrible shape before and even worse shape after. So we are working right now, as you know, relief funds were just approved, in the process of becoming approved.”

After laying blame for the grid’s historical and contemporary condition firmly on the shoulders of the island’s residents, Trump went on to acknowledge Puerto Rico’s water and food shortages — which he also blamed on islanders.

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“People don’t have drinking water. [But] we’ve delivered tremendous amounts of water,” Trump said. “What you have to do, you have to have distribution of the water, but by the people on the island. We have massive amounts of water. We have massive amounts of food. But they have to distribute it. They have to do it. They have to distribute the food to the people on the island. What we’ve done, we now have military distributing food, something that really they shouldn’t have to be doing.”

Following his assertion that federal officials sent specifically to assist with the crisis should not be expected to oversee the distribution of vital necessities, Trump returned to praising his administration’s efforts. Referencing praise from Governor Ricardo Rosselló, who has in reality repeatedly begged Trump for more aid for Puerto Rico, the president congratulated the federal relief response once again.

“If you look at the governor, who’s a good man… But you look at the governor of Puerto Rico, he has said we’ve done an outstanding job,” Trump said, before emphasizing again, “Puerto Rico is a tough one.”